The announcement made in August revealed the newest step for academic indigenization.
Concordia is waiving tuition for full-time and part-time students from all 42 First Nations and Inuit communities across Quebec starting this semester. This is the newest step in the Indigenous Directions Action Plan (IDAP), launched in 2019 as a collective effort throughout the university. The main actor was the Indigenous Directions Leadership Group, now the Indigenous Directions Leadership Council (IDLC).
“We’ve been working over the summer to let [the Indigenous communities] know that we were considering doing something like that, and the response has been overwhelmingly positive,” said Manon Tremblay, Senior Director of Indigenous Directions. “It may seem like a large number, 42 communities. That’s a lot of students and that’s a lot of money for Concordia.”
Tremblay estimates that around 120 students will benefit from the tuition waivers this year. “In future years this may attract more students.”
The action plan was Concordia University’s response to the Calls to Action of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). The TRC litigated the largest class-action settlement in Canadian history, the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, for reconciliation among people and communities impacted by residential schools.
A Canadian survey polled in 2021 shows that just under half of Indigenous adults had completed a post-secondary qualification. Non-university certificates/diplomas were the most common.
“There is a misconception that all Indigenous people get their tuition paid for by their band councils,” said Tremblay. “It’s definitely one of the ways that you can have tuition subsidized, but not every single First Nations person gets access to that for a variety of reasons.”
For instance, band councils have a predetermined amount of funds to help provide for students’ education. Consequently, these band councils come up with eligibility criteria, which leave some students in the lurch. With the new tuition waivers, Concordia can ensure that financial complications aren’t preventing them from getting a post-secondary education.
The University of Waterloo, the University of Toronto (UofT), and McGill University have sequentially begun implementing similar programs since 2022. In June, McGill announced their Indigenous Tuition Initiative (ITI), which will also be enacted in the 2024 fall semester.
McGill’s ITI covers the Kanien’kehaka (Mohawk) communities of Kahnawà:ke, Kanesatake and Akwesasne (including Saint Regis), as well as Indigenous students from the Six Nations of the Grand River and students in the McGill School of Social Work, the School of Continuing Studies or the Office of First Nations and Indigenous Education who are learning through an educational partnership with one of fifteen local groups.
Concordia’s sets itself apart by its scale. All First Nations and Inuit people in the province will be eligible, whereas other universities are only striking partnerships with their local communities. UofT, for instance, only offers tuition waivers to students from nine communities in the area.
“It creates a situation of inequity, and we want to make sure that the opportunities that we’re rolling out are to all Indigenous people in Quebec,” said Manon Tremblay.
Today, Concordia’s Indigenous student population approximates 120 students, around thirty per cent of which stems from out of province, as reported in February. With the waivers reaching a wider student population, education will be more evenly accessible.
Since implementing the IDAP, Concordia has put in place actions to make the university a safe space for Indigenous students, including the creation of Otsenhákta Student Centre (OSC) and the Kaié:ri Nikawerà:ke Indigenous Bridging Program.
The OSC, located on the sixth floor of the Henry F. Hall Building, is a space for all Indigenous students to find community and academic help and resources. “We’re here to ensure that those students who are coming from other communities have a space here that they can call home,” said OSC manager Cheyenne Henry.
“It’s our job to help provide that support and in that space and safeguard that space for students while they’re pursuing their educational journeys,” she added. “It’s been a huge endeavor and a lot of people are behind making this happen. It’s a good step forward.”
The Kaié:ri Nikawerà:ke Indigenous Bridging Program, inaugurated in fall 2023, aims to create a path to university for Indigenous students who have not met the traditional eligibility requirements.
“If there are no universities close to most of our communities, there’s even less adult education close to our communities,” explained Tremblay. “So that means that you have young people who would have to find the funds for travel accommodation just to pick up a couple of math classes.”
The IDLC is looking to update the action plan every four years. Since the last update in June 2021, the committee has been working on finding new methods to decolonize and indigenize Concordia’s curriculum. The next update is scheduled for next year.
“We’re working closely to constantly renew the action plan so that the recommendations make sense for where we are as a university right now,” said Anne Whitelaw, Concordia’s provost and vice-president. “It’s got to be a living document. Reforming and changing the curriculum is a long process.”
